Superstars lined up for WOMAD music festival

WOMAD’s artist programmer in charge of finding the freshest sounds for this year’s festival at Charlton Park has spoken about preparations for the four day event in July.

Paula Henderson first began working with the WOMAD team 25 years ago as an office junior, and now travels the world searching for the right acts to perform at The World of Music, Arts and Dance festivals.

Soul survivor Bobby Womack, Senegalese superstar Youssou N’Dour and Trombone Shorty, who has recorded with U2 and Eric Clapton, are among those revealed in the latest line-up announcement.

Mrs Henderson, who is based at Real World Studios, near Box, said: “I’m always looking for new artists to play at our events. I go to conferences around the world where I look at artists from various regions and I get sent a lot of proposals on the internet and attend lots of gigs.

“I am really excited about the line-up this year – you know the headliners will be fantastic and the one I am really looking forward to is Trombone Shorty. He will put on the best show; he’s a really good showman. His music is fab and I just think he will be great. ”

It is expected that 70 to 80 acts will appear during the festival, which runs from July 24-27, and 20 more acts are still to be announced.

Mrs Henderson said: “There may be something on the stage that you might not be keen on but there will always be plenty more you can go and look at – there’s always so much going on.”